High School
When I was in high school in rural Iowa, in the mid-1970s, two older friends from my home town both joined the Benedictine religious order for a while. One joined the very large St. John's Abbey in central Minnesota, which supports St. John's University. The other joined the remote Blue Cloud Abbey in South Dakota (now closed). I'd seen St. John's; I enjoyed going there twice for summer camp in junior high.
Visits to Benedictines as an Adult
I visited Blue Cloud Abbey twice, for several days each time, when my friend Chet was there and I was finishing high school and starting college (circa 1978, 1980). Almost twenty years later, my wife and I visited before we had kids, circa 1999. And we were at Blue Cloud with little daughters around 5 or 6 years old, prior to an Iowa family reunion, around 2008.
Discovering St. Andrew's, Los Angeles
So six or seven years ago I was happy to discover there is actually a Benedictine abbey associated with Los Angeles - St. Andrew's Abbey, about 90 miles north. It's over the Angeles Mountains, a beautiful mountain drive on Highway 2 from Pasadena. The Abbey is in the foothills on the north side of the mountain range and on the edge of the high desert.
I've done two weekend retreats at St. Andrews, and occasionally used it as a destination for a Saturday road trip with hiking and lunch. Always fun to cross the mountains on the way there. I've joked about the eclectic range of the retreats - Movies and Spirituality (real), Buddhism for Elementary School Teachers from a Benedictine Perspective (made-up, but not by much).
COVID
The Abbey is completely closed to outsiders for several months due to COVID. Normally, they have visitors in the guest suites all the time and 20-30 people show up every weekend for some type of retreat or another.
Retreats on Zoom / Fr. Dysinger
But a month ago, they began having Virtual Retreats, via ZOOM online. I attended one this past weekend, History of Benedictines, leading from the year 500 to the Abbey here today. It was five, 90 minute sessions and about 18 people attended.
The instructor was Fr. Luke Dysinger. Interestingly, Fr. Dysinger got his MD at USC in his 20s then did his family practice residency, and joined the Benedictines. They put him through priesthood training and a PhD in church history at Oxford. He lives at St. Andrews and he also teaches at a regional seminary.
The History Course - From Year 500 to 2000
So the course went through the centuries focusing on the history and divisions and reforms within the Benedictines. They are actually a loose confederation of about 15 types of Benedictines, meaning there isn’t any single Benedictine president or leader. For example, Cistercians and Trappists are offshoots of the Benedictine group.
St. Andrews has an interesting history. We learned that in the US, a lot of German monasteries of the mid 1800s set up branches in the US to serve the many German immigrants – giving us German Benedictine abbeys in Pennsylvania, Indiana, Minnesota.
St. Andrews today stems from a Belgian abbey, rather than a German one (St. Andre' in Bruges). In the 1920s, St. Andre' set up multiple missionary abbeys in distant locations. One was in central China.
Fleeing China or Death
When the abbey in China was a few decades old and had about 20 members, in the early 1950s, it was suddenly attacked by the communist government. Most monks emigrated (were expelled). Two monks who were were scheduled to leave last were imprisoned. One died in prison; the other was in prison almost 30 years.
St Andrews, 1940s in China:
Buying the Desert Ranch
The members who was able to leave, were eventually able to buy a desert ranch in SoCal and have been here since about 1955.
The population has actually been stable from the 1960s at around 20-25 monks. As mentioned they have very active weekend retreat programs. So now I know a lot more about the history of the place and I am looking forward to normal times and being able to get out there once a year, either for a weekend event or just for a Saturday excursion off the beaten path. It will be fun to meet Fr. Dysinger in person some day.
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German Churches in Rural Iowa
Hearing about the German abbeys in the US in the 1880s reminded me of our German Catholic brick churches in Carroll and Sac County in Iowa. Even tiny villages near where I group up, in towns with a few hundred residents like Breda and Mt Carmel, had glorious tall churches with high steeples, beautiful statues and stained glass, and they were built with elaborate carved High Altars.
I remember hearing as a youth that the glass and statues in these churches came from Germany. I can see what it must have been – the churches being built across the distant American farmland probably supported a far larger and active arts industry thriving in Bavaria and the Black Forest.
St Bernard’s in Breda, Iowa:
And Our Lady of Mt. Carmel church, in Mt. Carmel, Iowa:
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These churches are now in a rural consortium, here.
